All Episodes
Previous Next
Nov. 27, 2023 - The Unexplained - Howard Hughes
51:31
Edition 771 - John West
| Copy link to current segment

Time Text
Across the UK, across continental North America, and around the world on the internet, by webcast and by podcast.
My name is Howard Hughes, and this is The Unexplained.
Thank you very much for being part of my show.
Thank you for the emails and comments on my official Facebook page.
It is the official Facebook page of The Unexplained with Howard Hughes, the one with the logo and no other similar site.
I'm very grateful for all of your comments and very grateful for all of your support.
I'm finding this a challenging time at the end of the year.
I don't know.
I think I need to get myself a tonic or something.
That's a whole other issue.
Maybe a lot of other people feel that way too right now.
And I just thought I would reflect it here.
The weather?
Changeable.
Bits of sunshine, bits of cloud.
Sometimes very, very, very cold at night.
Sometimes not so cold by day or night.
Sometimes it feels like spring.
Next day it's cold.
But, you know, welcome to living in His Majesty's United Kingdom, I guess.
Now, what am I going to do?
Thank you very much to Adam, my webmaster, for his continued ongoing hard work on the show.
Guest on this edition, and my thanks to him for stepping in, John West.
Brand new book about ghosts.
John West, born in London, film producer, actor, author of books and articles on history, crime, ghosts, and folklore.
His first book on British ghosts, Britain's haunted heritage, published November 2019.
Two new titles, Britain's Ghostly Heritage, and the Battle of Gainsborough, 1843, followed in 2022.
There is a new book that was published at the end of October on Halloween, in fact, this year, 2023.
As a journalist, John currently writes for Psychic News and Suffolk and Norfolk Life.
Many, many features that he's written there.
We're going to talk with him about his brand new ghost book, the title of which we will reveal during the conversation.
And I think you're going to hear some amazing ghost stories here.
So my thanks to John West for doing this edition of The Unexplained at short notice.
We'll be meeting him very shortly.
Thank you very much for being part of the show.
If you've been expecting a reply to an email, if you put in the subject line reply required, you didn't get one, please do send me a reminder.
You know, head like a sieve me.
Always try to do too much.
I'm a little behind with emails at the moment.
Hopefully over the Christmas holidays, I'm going to get in, you know, in train with things and, you know, try and get some more guest booking done and various other things.
But it is, as they say, a one-man show.
If I wasn't coming up with the ideas and stuff for it, there would be no show.
So that's it.
That's half the fun of doing it, I think.
I like, you know, even though it's, you know, it's a challenge, I like the idea of being completely in control and not having to report to anybody for any of it.
It's a nice feeling at this time in my life when I had to work for enough organizations, some of which, one or two of which over the years, I did not agree.
Quietly, of course.
It's a whole other story.
All right, let's get to the guest on this edition of The Unexplained.
No more talking from me.
Let's go across London.
John West is here.
John, thank you very much for doing this.
Thank you.
It's a great pleasure.
I often listen to your show.
You've been pretty prolific with the books and the research, haven't you?
Yes, actually, my latest book, Britain's Haunted Land, is the third ghost book that I've written.
The other two was Britain's Haunted Heritage and Britain's Ghostly Heritage.
And I write for Psychic News magazine every month for coming up for about 10 years now.
So yeah, so I've been involved with ghosts for many, many years.
It all goes back to my mother.
She had loads of books when I was a kid.
And I used to read them when she weren't around.
So I got hooked at a very early age on ghosts.
No, I didn't.
And I was making a living.
I read that in your biography that, you know, this goes back to when you were a kid.
And your mother had a great interest in these things, it seems.
She did.
She was always interested in ghosts.
She used to go to psychics as well, ever since she was a child.
And I can just remember in the 70s as a kid, she had all these like pan paperbacks and books by Elliot O'Donnell and Peter Underwood.
And as I said, when she wasn't around, I used to read them and I just fell in love with the stories and became fascinated with it.
But yeah, I owe it all to my mum.
She was a great believer in the paranormal and had experiences herself when she was a child, you know, heard things, saw things.
And yes, I basically got it from her.
And I've also got Celtic ancestry as well.
On both sides of my family, I've got Welsh ancestry.
My mum grew up in South Wales.
And they do say the Celts are a bit more successful.
You know, they're a bit more in tune, shall we say, with the psychic side.
Yeah, no, well, I would agree with that because that's my heritage too.
Your biography describes you as film actor, producer, and of course, author.
That's a lot of things to do.
It is.
I used to be a DJ as well, but I don't do that anymore.
Yes, I work with a chap called Jason Figgis, a director based in Dublin, and we make films together.
And I've done acting in a film with The Ghost of Winifred Meeks, which was a haunted house feature filmed in Suffolk, a place called Dunwich, which is a very haunted place.
And I was even recently in a film called Boudicca, Jesse Johnson's film, where I play a Roman soldier who ends up killing Boudicca at the end.
You see me, well, with a sword, shall we say, cutting her down, but it was only acting icing alive.
Well, no, very pleased to hear it.
Can I just explain to my listener, there is some breakup here on this connection.
Obviously, we'll stop the conversation if we can't continue, but there may be a little bit of breakup.
I can hear what you're saying, so it's not an issue for me so far.
And John, so that you know that too, there's a little bit, if you can be near a window or something on this phone connection, that would be great.
Just to, you know, try and get it.
Okay, yeah, I'll move towards the window.
I'm sitting on the other side of the room, but let me just move over to the window.
I'll sit on the sofa and hopefully that'll be a little bit better for you.
There you go.
I'm sure that's going to clear it up a treat.
Talk to me about this book then.
This is one of a series of books that you've written about ghosts.
What was the idea behind it?
Well, I just, I'm so fascinated with ghost stories and I just wanted to share some of my favorite stories with people and, you know, make people think about these places because I regard ghost stories as part of our history, part of our heritage.
You know, you go to a castle, there's so many stories connected with these places, you know, headless horsemen, grey ladies and things like that.
So I basically just want to Make people aware of how haunted this country is.
And, you know, when they go out to visit a lovely location, perhaps find a little bit more out about the ghosts rather than just, you know, King Henry VIII and what he did there.
Seems to be an enduring fascination.
You've only got to look at the newspapers every week.
You know, the newspapers like the Daily Express, Daily Star, Sun and Mirror fall all over themselves every week to try and get some ghost stories in there.
Why do you think there is that continuing fascination?
Well, I just think we're all fascinated with the idea of life after death.
And we all want there to be something beyond this world, you know, because everyone, you know, even if they don't admit it, no one likes the idea of, you know, when you're gone, that's it.
We all like the idea that there's a heaven or we exist in another form.
And it's just mysteries as well.
I think, you know, ghosts are mysterious things.
We don't really know what causes them.
There's lots of different theories, whether it's like recordings or the souls of the dead.
And we just basically all have a good mystery.
It's like a lot mess monster in the Yeti, isn't it?
We want to believe in it and hope it's true, but we're not too sure.
That sums it up better than I've heard it summed up for many a long year, John.
Thank you.
Thank you.
You've got a great mix of stories in here.
Stories from recent years, stories that take us all the way back, I think, to the 1700s or certainly 1800s in a couple of cases.
Why this mix?
Well, again, I just want to sort of have ghost stories from across the centuries because there's modern ghosts as well.
There's the ghost bus of Kensington from the 1930s.
Who would think there'd be a ghost bus, but apparently there was.
But, you know, you've got Bronze Age horsemen haunting roads in the southwest.
You've got Roman soldiers being seen at Richborough Castle in Kent.
So I just wanted to sort of delve into all those different time periods, you know, from modern to the past.
You know, it's just a fascinating subject.
And every period seems to have its ghosts, even the Romans.
Do you go on ghost hunts?
I have done.
They tend to be a little bit too commercial for me, to be honest.
And I'm not really into all the sort of gadgets and that because I really don't think they particularly work.
But I have been on the odd one.
And, you know, I haven't really experienced anything because the trouble is if you've got like 20, 30 people at a ghost hunt, I went to one in Framlingham Castle, which Ed Sheeran wrote about in one of his famous songs.
And there was about 30 of us, but I didn't experience anything, to be quite honest.
People claim to have felt a presence.
I certainly didn't feel it.
But I think if there's too many people there, you know, the ghosts are probably going to go in the other direction.
And they don't always appear to order anyway.
You know, going to a castle on Halloween or Bawley on Halloween doesn't mean you're going to meet the nun or Henry VIII.
No, well, that's true.
You know, I've been to Hampton Court many times.
I've heard stories from the curators there, the people who liaise with the public, you know, interface with the public there.
Hair-raising stories, amazing story of ghosts.
In all the years, and I don't live very far from it, I've never seen anything.
It's certainly an atmospheric place, but I haven't experienced the ghosts myself.
So I think they don't, as you say, appear to order.
Listen, you mentioned the haunted bus.
I was going to do that later, but we might as well talk about that because I heard a story.
In fact, the story is on one of my podcasts from my former Capitol Radio colleague, Cara Noble, who saw a bus that appeared to be from another era appear and disappear in London.
This is a few decades ago.
Talk to me about this 1930s bus story.
Well, it was North Kensington.
It'd be interesting to see if your friends saw the bus in that area, because that means it's still haunting the area, because I was told it didn't anymore.
But basically, what it was in the 1930s in Kensington, there was St. Mark's Road, and it was a dangerous corner with Cambridge Gardens.
And there'd been a lot of accidents there, including a chap who'd been killed in a head-on collision with another car.
And people then started to claim that after the buses have stopped running, i.e.
after 12 o'clock at night, they'd seen a bus, lights blazing, tearing down this road around the corner.
And cars, you know, going home late at night would swerve to avoid it.
And sometimes it would hit the walls.
And Peter Underwood, who wrote loads of books on ghosts, actually interviewed a couple who said that it got so bad that they used to sit up at night after midnight waiting for the cars to basically crash and they'd hear the bus tearing down the road.
There was no one in the bus, no passengers, no driver, but all the lights were blazing and then it would vanish.
One chap even claimed he saw it pull into a bus depot totally empty.
All the lights went off and then boom, it vanished.
But the weird thing is that they finally decided to alter this corner, which, as I said, was quite dangerous and it caused a lot of accidents because it was a blind spot.
And after that, the bus was never seen again.
So whether it was some sort of higher power was sending that bus down to say, look, you've got to sort this corner out or else, I don't know, but it's very weird.
I mean, obviously a bus is not a living entity.
So why did it appear?
And there was certainly no one in the bus when it was seen.
So it's just one of those cases that you just can't explain, really.
And Peter Underwood interviewed people who swore they'd seen it.
And he was quite impressed with their testimonies.
So I've no doubt that, you know, they were telling the truth.
Well, the unusual thing about the ghost bus, obviously, it wasn't a living entity.
So what caused it?
And the fact that it vanished after the road was altered.
So did some higher power send that bus down to warn people a road needs to be altered because people are getting injured and killed?
I don't know, but it certainly hasn't been seen since the 1930s.
And I even went back and checked original newspaper reports from the Times and it was definitely seen.
So many people that Peter Underwood spoke to had seen it.
They've got no reason to lie, but it's just one of those tauntings that you just, you know, what caused it?
Why did it appear?
You know, it's a mystery.
But again, as you said, one of your friends saw the bus, so I hope it hasn't reappeared.
None as far as I'm aware, and no recent reports of the thing.
But the unusual thing about it is, as you say, it is tied into actual events that when they made a change to the dangerous corner, the bus disappeared.
The bus was not there anymore.
That's correct.
And that's why people can't explain it.
So I don't know what it is.
It's just one of those hauntings.
Something clearly happened.
A bus was definitely seen.
But with so many ghost stories, there's never an easy explanation, you know, why something would appear.
And, you know, I've gone to loads of haunted locations.
Someone said, oh, there's a little girl that appears and she walks through a wall in a church.
but there's no reason for the haunting, there's no backstory.
So, whether it's, you know, why does she appear?
Why does she keep going through a wall?
You know, and we just don't know.
It's just one of those mysteries.
We'll only really find out what it's all about until it's our time to move on, shall we say?
I think so.
But that's a great story.
And, you know, knowing somebody who actually experienced it, I think makes it all the more interesting.
All right.
Early on in the book, you talk about the haunted bypass.
This is Yorkshire, I believe in the 1980s.
And I'm going to read, if you don't mind, a little bit from the book.
Two security men, David Goldthorpe and Stephen Brooks, were patrolling the area.
They'd been keeping an eye on the site, which is near the M1 motorway, for two months.
It was near midnight, and the pair were driving past an electric pylon when they saw beneath the structure a group of four or five children dressed in what they described as, quote, old-fashioned clothes, dancing in a circle.
The men stopped and searched the area, but could find no trace of the children.
Although the area was muddy, the spot where the children had been dancing was strangely devoid of footprints.
The men continued with their inspection of the building site and made their way back to the bridge.
They could see a white figure in a hood standing on the parapet.
They drove up a ramp and stopped the car on P. Royd Lane.
The figure was still visible, and David Goldthorpe turned the car headlights on to full beam.
The light shone right through the figure, and it then vanished.
The men were so shocked by their experience, they ended their shift and made their way to nearby Mexborough, where the security company was based.
They told their boss what had happened.
He later recalled how shocked they were.
One of the men was even in tears as he spoke about what they had seen.
But this is a story that keeps on giving because from the way that you tell it, John, two paranormal investigators and a police officer researched the case and got involved, yeah?
Yes, that's correct.
Because these two chaps went to the police station.
This police officer was an amateur historian and he researched the story and found out it was a legend of a monk who had vanished in the area and supposedly haunted the area.
What the children were, we don't know.
There's no sort of backstory about that apart from a vague tale.
A car overturned and some people were killed, possibly children.
There was no historical records for that.
So he went down there with a colleague and they saw this strange looking figure, like a monk.
And they were both terrified.
And it's just, it keeps going, this story.
I've spoken to people who've claimed to have seen figures by the road.
One couple claimed to have seen all they could like in it was some weird black figure with massive arms waving around it, hovering above a field and then shot across the road.
And funny enough, earlier this year, I actually ended up driving along that bypass.
I didn't realise until I was on it.
I thought, my God, I'm on the haunted bypass.
But I'm sad to say I never saw or experienced anything, but I did keep a lookout for the monk.
But it is an accident black spot.
It is a very twisty, dangerous road.
But again, it's got a bad reputation.
I do know some people who won't use that road just because of the fear of seeing this entity, whether it is a monk or something else, or just because, you know, the road is so dangerous.
Can we just give the location a little better than I did?
It's near the M1, isn't it?
Is it South Yorkshire?
Yes, South Yorkshire, the Stocksbridge Bypass.
And it's, yeah, so just pick it up on the map and take a drive along there and see what you experience.
But let me know if you bump into the monk.
I hope he doesn't run out in front of your car, though, because apparently he's done that a few times.
I mean, the description, the police officer, this is P.C. Ellis, and I think one of his colleagues, they actually took a police car there.
And you write about it.
You say in the book, the window of the car on P.C. Ellis' side was down and his arm was resting on the door.
Suddenly he was overcome with a feeling of fear.
He went cold and couldn't move his body.
He felt that somebody was standing next to him with their chest pushed against the open window.
He turned his head to the right and saw something by the car.
It was the upper half of a man with a V on his chest.
The figure vanished and reappeared on the passenger side of the car.
His colleague, this is, was it constable or anyway, the colleague was called Mr. Beat, screamed and hit P.C. Ellis on the arm.
Beat had seen a man with piercing eyes, a wizened face and a pointed nose.
He felt that the man was connected to the 1800s.
He looked again and the figure was gone.
Not often you get reports like that.
I know, I know.
And these police officers were terrified and they stuck to their story.
I mean, let's face it, if you're a police officer and you say you saw a ghost, it's probably not going to do your career a lot of good because there is a lot of prejudice out there with senior figures, shall we say, who experience the supernatural.
But yeah, they stuck to their story.
I never got to speak to them, but I spoke to people who knew them and they said, yeah, they never changed the story.
They saw this figure on that bypass, you know, when it was being constructed and it terrified them.
So, and as I said, the figure's still apparently hanging around today.
There was a couple of people who claimed to have seen it when they were jogging and it had no legs and it was carrying like a sack.
And, you know, they were totally terrified.
But here again, you know, some people claim it's a monk.
Other people claim it's from a later period, you know, like 1800.
So who knows?
But there's something going on there.
There's a lot of legends and stories, but I'm quite open-minded.
It could be a monk.
It could be something else.
And the dancing children?
Well, yes.
I mean, around the pylon.
And there was a chap who lived in a caravan above the site who, when they spoke to him, he said, yeah, I often see the children.
So again, there's no reason for why they appear or, you know, why they're dancing around the pylon.
The police officer found this vague story that a cart had overturned and that children may have been in it and died.
But again, I've often found with some of these tales that they invent a story to account for a haunting.
You know, they do a backstory because they thought, why is this monk appearing or why is this knight riding along the lane?
So they make up a story to account for it.
But yeah, that's a story anyway that the children are apparently killed when a car overturns.
Dover Castle, not long after that story in the book, a few pages on.
I've heard stories about Dover Castle.
You talk about the red lady who haunts the Great Hole wearing a long flowing red dress, but who she was in life has been lost to history.
We don't know.
Figure from the English Civil War haunts the ground floor of the castle.
He's been described as wearing a purple cloak, a wide-brimmed hat, and knee-high riding boots.
Now, look, I mean, these kind of stories doesn't do the tourist trade any harm, but it seems that Dover Castle has more than most.
Oh, yes, I've been to Dover Castle a few times.
There's also a phantom dog, apparently, that haunts the place.
He was sadly bricked up by the Normans as a sort of foundation sacrifice.
And when his owner complained, apparently they bricked her up too, an old woman.
So they're supposed to haunt it.
But yeah, it certainly doesn't harm the tourist trades, shall we say.
But again, there's been paranormal investigations there.
And there was actually a famous bit of footage which was shown on a TV show many years ago presented by Michael Aspel.
I think it was called Strange But True.
And they actually got footage of a door violently shaking when there was no one on the other side.
But the paranormal investigator got a bit carried away and said, my God, you know, and because as soon as he shouted out, the doors stopped moving.
But also the repeater station there, because as you probably know, in the Second World War, there was tunnels constructed, you know, for D-Day and things like that.
And a repeater station is supposedly haunted by a man in naval costume called Bill Billings.
And once a woman was terrified, she saw this chap walking towards her in uniform, and she assumed that he was perhaps a reenactor or something.
And he walked straight through her.
And she had a bit of a panic attack.
And there was an American couple as well who were looking around.
And they commented on, oh, we love the sound effects of all the moans and groans and screams.
And the guide said, there are no sound effects.
So they panicked and searched the area because they thought, my God, someone's perhaps fallen over and is in pain and, you know, has wandered off into an area that he shouldn't have.
They searched the whole area and no one there.
But this American couple swore that they heard screams and moans and groans coming from a particular part of the tunnels.
I know that I don't know whether it still goes there, but certainly the old trains that used to run out of, I think, Victoria.
I remember going on a day trip to France with my sister years ago.
And we got up at the crack of dawn, left London, went across Trafalgar Square, and we went from Charing Cross.
That's where we went.
And the old train goes right past Dover Castle.
It's a really impressive building.
Oh, it is.
And there's a Roman lighthouse there as well, the only surviving Roman lighthouse in Britain.
And it survived because they turned into a church tower.
And apparently that's supposed to be haunted by a Roman soldier.
Although I've never seen the Roman soldier when I went there and I've never been able to trace anyone who actually saw it.
And apparently a monk shares the place with him as well.
So I don't know what they talk about.
But yeah, this is a Roman there.
But it's a fascinating building and well worth a visit, you know, just for the feeling of history there is so wonderful.
And I definitely felt a presence when I went there, but I must admit I didn't see anything.
But I did feel sometimes when I went into rooms that I wasn't alone.
But again, I was aware it was haunted.
So perhaps it was just suggestion on my part.
Just a quick word for my listener.
There is just the very occasional breakup on the sound here.
Obviously, if this is difficult for you, please turn it off now.
But I can understand everything that John is saying, and I'm guessing you can too, which is why I'm continuing with this, just to let you know.
The brown lady of Raynham Hall, is it Ranham or Raynham Hall?
I think it's Raynham, isn't it, in Essex?
Raynham is how I've been told it's pronounced.
But I'm not from Norfolk, so they might disagree with that.
It's Norfolk.
The Brown Lady appeared to remain quiet after a lot of activity until 1926 when she was seen on a staircase by the son of Lady Townsend.
This was the famous Townsend family who owned this place.
Also witnessed at the same time by his friends, they identified the ghost by comparing her to a portrait of Dorothy Walpole that was hanging in the so-called haunted room.
The brown lady.
Yes, well, actually, she's the sister of Robert Walpole, the Prime Minister.
Yeah, and she was in a very unhappy marriage with a townsend, and he apparently was a bit of a control freak and wouldn't let her leave the building.
And she died of smallpox, and she's been haunting the building ever since.
But apparently, the Prince Regent once saw her, and he was so terrified that he basically legged it and said he'd never stay in the building again.
He described it as sort of having his terrible looking face really pale, and it just freaked him out.
But yeah, one chap in the 19th century actually lay in wait for her, waiting down his corridor, and he had a pistol with him.
I mean, thank God it wasn't a prank, but he saw this woman coming towards him with a taper, and she came right up close to him.
And he said she had a diabolical grin, and he fired the pistol at her.
Unfortunately, she was a ghost, unless he was making it all up, and it went through and embedded itself in the door.
And it terrified him.
But as I said, I'm just glad it wasn't someone pulling a prank because obviously he would have been in trouble with the police after that.
The weeping lady of Holy Trinity Church, Micklegate in York.
Oh, yes.
Well, that's a fascinating case.
Sadly, apparently she's long vanished.
But this was, remember a chap called Sabine Bering Gould who did Onward Christian Soldiers?
Can you just write about his book?
You broke up slightly.
Could you just repeat the book?
Oh, yeah.
Sabine Bering Gould.
Yeah, sorry.
Yeah.
Sabine Bering Gould.
I don't know if you remember him.
He wrote Onward Christian Soldiers.
And he first publicised this in a book of his called Yorkshire Oddities.
And it caused a storm of controversy.
It got in the press at the time and everything.
But apparently what it was, there was this east window.
And at certain times of the year, for weeks or months, it wouldn't appear, but people would be inside the church and they would see figures appear.
And it was weirdly described as being on and beyond the window.
And it'd be like two female figures and a child.
And it'd be a woman as if she was weeping.
Then another figure would appear holding a child and it would give this woman a child and she'd be weeping and they'd both Be sort of well, you know, it's just throwing her arms around as if in distress.
And then the baby, the child would be taken away.
And people actually went outside to see what was going on because they thought, you know, what on earth is this all about?
There was no one out there.
They even had someone on watch outside, and the figures were still seen inside.
But the chap said there was no one out there at all, whatsoever.
And there's again a legend, I don't know if it was made up to account for what they'd seen, but apparently a mother and child had died of the plague and they hadn't been buried together.
And she'd been buried in Holy Trinity and the child had been buried outside in the plague pit.
And the other figure who they described as the nurse was bringing her the child to see, you know, every few months and then, you know, would take her back to the plague pit.
But again, there's no historical evidence for that.
And I'd probably, I suspect that that story was made up to account for what was seen.
But anyway, it got in the press.
The vicar was really annoyed and said it's a load of rubbish.
It's people outside or it's mass hallucinations and things like that.
And eventually they changed the window.
They claimed they just did it because it needed a new window.
But from what I've been told, he probably did it to hope to get rid of the ghost.
And it worked because they were never seen again.
Though a woman in the 20th century did claim that when she went into the church, she had a feeling of oppression and said it smelt like a charnel house.
But that was about it.
But she's never been seen since.
And I've been to York many times and spoken to people who live in and around that area.
And I said, have you ever seen anything in the church, experienced anything?
And they said, no.
And in fact, they didn't even know the place had been haunted.
So that one's certainly been exercised.
But again, why did it go with the removal of the window?
And who were these people?
And why couldn't you see them from outside?
And why did they also appear as if they were actually on the glass as well, rather than just beyond it?
So again, but so many people saw it, different witnesses over a different time period, you know, including years.
So there was something going on.
But again, it's just one of these things.
It happened.
But what caused it and who these figures were and why they vanished, we don't know.
And another story, just like the bus, where a change of circumstances changed the apparition.
So they changed the window.
They improved the corner for the bus.
In both situations, whatever was happening there and people were seen disappeared.
Exactly, exactly.
I mean, you know, it probably was the fact the window was removed.
I mean, why it would erase the haunting, I don't know.
There is this stone-tape theory, of course, you know, that impressions, emotions are imprinted into the fabric of a building or even the soil and are played back.
So whether it was a recording that was somehow weirdly recorded on this window and removing the window erased the haunting, I honestly don't know.
It's a bit like the Roman soldiers that were seen at the treasurer's house in York.
They were clearly a recording marching across this cellar, these solid Roman soldiers.
And when they altered the cellar, they were never seen again.
So it's interesting.
You've probably hit the nail on the head.
It probably was a removal of the window and it erased the recording for whatever reason.
You've got a couple of great stories that are based around images, photographs in the book.
And I like the way that you move around different forms of phenomena.
And there's a whole section about photographs and images.
One of them is the return of Freddie Jackson.
And the other one is A Phantom Priest.
Now, let's talk about the return of Freddie Jackson first.
It's on page 33 of the book.
And this is a photograph of a bunch of service people from HMS Daedalus, a training facility, gathered together at RAF Cranwell for a squadron group photograph before they were disbanded.
This was 1919 after the First World War.
But what was interesting about the picture, apparently, is that somebody who had expired before the picture was taken was on the picture.
That's correct.
That's correct.
A chap called Sir Victor Goddard wrote about it and he reproduced a photograph.
And if you Google it, you'll find a photograph.
And there's clearly the figure of Freddie Jackson standing behind the rest of them because they're all like posed in rows.
And he's the only one without a cap.
And people looked at it and said, that's Freddie Jackson.
And they had checked the photograph for, you know, had it been tampered with.
Apparently it hadn't.
So he'd appeared on that photograph.
And I just like to think that the squadron was being disbanded.
And even though he died and was in spirit form, he wanted to be there for that last photograph.
And what do you know about Freddie Jackson?
Well, not a lot is known about him, actually.
He was just in the service.
He died in an accident not long before the photograph was taken and appeared in that photograph and was never ever seen again.
His ghost doesn't haunt that place, you know, the old RAF base.
So it was literally a one-off recording.
But people have said, oh, it could have been just a double exposure of someone in that photograph.
But as I said, his is the only face where there's no, he's not wearing a cap.
And people who knew him pointed it out and said, that is Freddie Jackson.
But sadly, we don't know much about the guy.
You know, he's more famous for the fact he appeared in a photograph as a ghost.
And, you know, you couldn't write a book about him.
Let's just say that.
If it was 2023, I mean, it's a fascinating picture because he looks completely part of that photograph and it's in the book.
Today, they would say it's Photoshop.
And I suppose in those days they might have said, you know, somebody played with the negative or something, but it doesn't look that way.
And also the fact that people pointed him out and said, that's Freddie Jackson.
I know people would say, oh, they could have had a photograph of him and added it.
But as I said, apparently the negative had not been interfered with in any way, shape or form.
And so I personally would say there's a lot of fake ghost photographs out there, but I would, you know, stake my reputation and state that that is a genuine photograph of someone who'd passed on.
And I just think he wanted to be in that group photograph before he went off to wherever he had to go.
There's a photograph from a place that I know in West Sussex, Arundel Cathedral, which is sort of just, well, behind Worthing, basically.
Yeah, St. Nicholas Church, it's called.
Is it?
St. Nicholas?
Okay.
But anyway, whatever it is, it's a beautiful, A beautiful place.
Now, there is a photograph of the altar there, and it is claimed that what is appearing in front of the altar is a phantom priest.
It's a great picture.
Yes, yeah, it was taken by a solicitor in, I think it was 1940, and he claimed there was no one in the church at the time.
He took this photograph, got it developed, saw this wispy figure, like as if it was holding a taper, going up the steps of the altar.
And he swore blind, as I said, that there was no one in the church apart from him.
Now, people have analyzed this photograph using computers and they claim that it's a figure ascending the stairs to the altar with a taper to light the candles.
And they think, oh, it's just a long exposure.
And he didn't see the person come in.
But he was insistent that there was no one walked in front of him.
And he actually said to people, he said, if I'd seen someone walk in front of the camera, I would have, you know, stop taking photographs.
He said, there was no one there.
So again, and there is a legend that there's a story that a woman haunts the church.
So no people claim it's a phantom priest.
Other people claim it's a phantom lady.
But again, it's a fascinating photograph.
And he was a solicitor and he said there was no one in the church when he took that photograph.
So this claim that it's a double exposure and, you know, he just left the camera running and someone went up and lit a candle and walked off and he didn't notice.
I think there's a bit of a lame sort of explanation for why that would appear.
We're talking with John West about his new book, all about some strange ghost and paranormal stories.
They're not all ghost stories, are they, John?
There's a great story on page 96, and this is from 1993.
It's kind of a time travel story, and if you don't mind again, I'm going to read it from the book.
This is Alf and Eileen Roberts.
They're on their way home from a holiday.
They were traveling through Devon towards a hotel in Dunster in Somerset.
I know that place.
But found themselves lost.
The couple stopped at a green to check their map, but accidentally burned it with a cigarette.
Then they noticed a large varnished wooden sign in the middle of a flower bed, which read something like, Award for the best kept village, Brampton, 1976.
Both were struck by the beauty of the surroundings and the vibrant colours of the flower beds, the hanging baskets, the window box displays.
They decided then to drive on, taking note of the pink and orange paintwork of the stone cottages.
They reached the end of the village, but then decided to turn back.
The couple saw an old man walking up the hill and asked him for directions.
They then drove through an avenue of trees that had grown across the road.
Although it was not yet dusk, it became so dark that Alf was forced to switch the headlights on and they drove on.
The couple decided to return to the village the following day to take some photographs.
They were surprised to see that the sign and the flower beds had vanished from the green.
The area was now just grass.
The village had also changed.
The flower displays were gone and even the colours of the houses were different.
Unless they were mistaken and they'd gone somewhere else, that's a time slip, isn't it?
Exactly.
And I am a great believer in time slips.
As Einstein said, you know, time isn't how we imagine it.
And yeah, I just think they briefly went back in time.
And I think perhaps we also sometimes go forward in time as well, people.
And perhaps that's accounts.
And sometimes they never come back, which accounts for why some people vanish completely.
But I've spoken to many, many people who've had odd experiences, you know, time slips and that.
I mean, Jason Figgers, a director I worked with, was at Avebury and bumped into two people who were dressed in clothing, shall we say, that wasn't modern.
And he just had a weird experience.
And looking back, he did think, you know, were they from the past?
So yeah, I think that was definitely a time slip.
And obviously there's a Versailles case, isn't there, where the two ladies apparently went back to the court of Marie Antoinette.
So yeah, I think it happens, yeah, that sometimes we do have a glimpse into the past and possibly the future.
Interesting, though, in this case from 1993, it's not often you hear contemporary stories.
It's nice to hear this one.
If they did go back inadvertently to 1976 or thereabouts, they went back to a time that was possibly the proudest time of that village.
If they had those beautiful greens and it was such a great vision and perhaps it was less so or less prominent in later years, they went back to a specific time where something had occurred and that something was, there were clearly a lot of things for that place to be proud of in that year.
Yes, yeah, exactly.
I mean, why it happened, why it was particularly at that time, I don't know.
Perhaps it was because there was a lot of emotions at that time.
It was so proud and it somehow connected with 1993.
I don't know.
I mean, time's a strange thing.
I mean, you know, there was a case in the Isle of Wight.
A couple were driving home one night and they suddenly saw all these lights, flickering lights in the fields.
And then they saw these people carrying torches and they were like wearing leather jerkins and she couldn't work out whether it was Romans or Vikings.
And it really terrified them.
But in the next instant, they suddenly saw this futuristic city stretching off into the distance across the Solent.
So it looks like they'd gone back to the Roman or Viking period and then jumped forward into the far future where most of the Isle of Wight was a city with all these weird coloured lights.
And I had a time slip experience myself as well.
I was in Hereford and there's a ruins down Avenue, it's Greyfriars Priory.
And I was walking around there and then all of a sudden the modern sounds started to fade away, including the traffic, the sounds of children playing because there was a school nearby.
And then I started to get the feeling that the building was sort of becoming as it was, as it looked when it was being used.
But then in a few seconds, it was gone and I was back in the modern age.
But I did wonder, you know, if I'd concentrated on that happening, because I did feel that if I'd concentrated on it more, it would continue.
But I got a bit scared and I thought, God, you know, if I end up in the medieval period, I'm never going to get back.
So I sort of whirled myself back into the modern age.
But I did think, you know, if it had carried on, would I have been stuck back in the medieval age and ended up being, I don't know, strung up as a witch Or something, you know, who's this guy with a weird watch and clothes and stuff.
Well, if you think that time is like an old-fashioned LP for people who don't remember LPs, of course, they had various bands or tracks on them.
And sometimes, if you knocked the playing arm of the record player, you know, you and I will remember this, John.
There may be some people who don't, though.
You would skip forward.
I remember going away.
Well, you know, exactly.
So, you know, similarly, I think this can happen with time, and that time is a series of concentric circles.
You could view it that way.
And if you somehow knock the arm that's playing the current run of time that you're in, then you can find yourself catapulted forward in time, maybe, but more regularly, it seems from accounts, back in time, rather like the famous Bold Street time slip in Liverpool that I would love to have experienced because it's in a place that I know very well where a couple of people were catapulted back to the 1950s.
And you always think to yourself, like with you in Hereford, were the people who were around then when you went back as you did, were they aware of you?
Were you part of the scene there or were you just witnessing?
Yeah, that's an interesting point because these figures on the Isle of Wight weren't aware of the car.
But, you know, and I remember the Liverpool one because I thought, what a great thing to happen.
Imagine if you'd stayed there and you could have met John Lennon and Paul McCartney in the 1950s and knew exactly what was going to happen to them.
But there have been cases where people have had time slips and they've interacted with the people from the other time.
There was a case many years ago, a teacher, he was in St. Albans in Hertfordshire.
It was a Roman City Verulanium.
And he was with some friends at the ruins of the London Gate.
And he had a time slip and a chariot appeared with a soldier.
And the horses saw him and reacted badly and refused to go on.
But weirdly, the soldier, the chap on the chariot, could not see him.
But the horses did.
And there was another case, I can't remember exactly where it was now, but a chap claimed to have seen a woman in Roman clothing look at him shocked and then she vanished.
Again, was that a time slip?
And to her, he was the ghost.
So I think sometimes, well, from what I've been told, yeah, sometimes we do interact with these people, but more often than not, we don't.
They seem to be unaware of us.
But again, it's a lovely way you've described it about an LP.
So, yeah, I think you're right.
It's, you know, and as Einstein said, and I already said this, you know, time isn't as we imagine, you know, the past, present, and future are probably running along parallel lines.
Which would explain a lot of things like deja vu and many other things that we find hard, you know, to put rational explanations to.
One of the things you told me in our email exchange, and again, thank you very much for doing this at short notice, John.
It was very kind of you.
And I think we've overcome the connection problems that we've got too.
I certainly have been able to follow what you were saying.
You said that, unlike a lot of people who write books about ghosts, you've actually had ghostly experiences yourself.
Can you think of one or maybe two that impressed themselves upon you?
Yes, yes.
I've had a few actually.
I mean, I lived in Lincolnshire for a time in the 1990s, a place called Messenham.
I better not say the house in case the people are listening in, don't want to scare them.
But it was a modern house.
Well, it was built in the 1950s.
It was built on the south of an earlier property, Victorian.
And I used to hear a dog running up the stairs and running around my bed.
And this happened many, many times.
It was clearly a large dog because of the sound.
And the first few times I was terrified and I wouldn't look at it or anything like that.
And I used to hide under the covers, you know, the usual thing when you see a ghost or hear a ghost, you hide under the covers.
If you're in bed or not, it'd do much good, of course, if it wanted to get you.
But then it would go.
And this went on for years.
And then when I moved to Suffolk, this dog, whatever it was, followed me around and did the same thing.
But then it suddenly stopped.
But so I had that.
And there's no explanation for what it was.
It hasn't happened for years, but he actually followed me.
And sometimes ghosts apparently do follow people.
I moved to Saxe-Mundam in Suffolk.
I don't live there now.
And it was a 17th century property.
And two nights I had the duvet pulled off me rather hard.
And I was the only person in the place.
There was no one else there.
I saw a figure from the corner of my eye once of a lady in a sort of black dress with crinoline.
And also, I just felt a presence occasionally.
Things would be moved.
I'd hear noises.
But after a while, these things quietened down and it never happened again.
So I think they got used to me.
But that's again something I've often found with haunted properties.
If you move into a property, the activity is quite intense for a bit.
It's almost as like they're getting used to, who is this person?
So there's a couple of instances that I've had.
And I mean, I had the time slip, of course, in Hereford.
I went to Hampton Court recently.
I did feel a presence in the kitchen.
That was just a feeling.
But yeah, I've certainly had a few experiences.
The weirdest one, you probably think I'm mad for saying this, but it happened.
I was driving my car through Woodbridge, which is again a little town in Suffolk.
And I was the only car on the road.
I think it was only sort of like early evening.
And all I can describe it as, it was like a giant stick insect crossed the road.
It was like this black entity, but really sort of skinny with long legs.
And it was like the size of a horse, but it wasn't a horse because it was black and too skinny.
And it just crossed from right to left.
And, you know, I thought, and I wasn't scared though.
That's the funny thing.
None of these things that happened to me, like with a dog and where the duvet scared me a bit.
And I said to whoever it was, don't do it again.
But you'd think I'd be terrified by seeing that thing cross a row, but it wasn't.
I was more puzzled.
But what it was, I do not know.
It was like some sort of like giant stick insect, you know, for want of a better description.
Well, I was thinking, because you know that Woodbridge, this is the scene of the famous Rendlesham Forest UFO claimed encounter, extraterrestrial, whatever it was, encounter in 1980.
That's not all that goes on there.
There are people who say that all kinds of weird stuff happened in that area.
Oh, yes, yeah.
I mean, whether it was an alien, I don't know.
I was thinking praying mantis, you know, style.
Oh, yeah.
That's a good description, actually, because it was like that sort of thing.
Yeah, it was very long with legs and Totally black, but I couldn't see it.
It didn't seem to have a head.
You know, that was a weird thing about it.
But it definitely crossed the road in broad daylight.
But a lot of people who've gone to Rendersham Forest don't like it.
They said they get a bad feeling there.
They feel they're being watched.
People have claimed to have seen the sort of like big cats there and things like that, or heard sounds at night that they can't explain.
I've been to Rendersham Forest a few times.
I've never experienced anything myself because they actually have a UFO warp there now.
You can follow the trail of where those are and apparently saw the UFO.
But it's a strange area.
People have even claimed to have seen the ghosts of Saxons there because it was apparently a Saxon palace.
And of course, you've got Sutton who with the, you know, which is supposed to be haunted.
And the lady that, you know, financed the original excavation was a spiritualist and was actually told to dig in that particular spot and she'd find the treasure.
And lo and behold, she did.
Not in this book, but you've discussed Borley Rectory, said to be one of the most active sites.
I mean, Borley Rectory itself doesn't exist anymore, but the site is certainly still there.
Do you have any thoughts about Borley Rectory?
Yes, that's in my first ghost book, Britain's Taunted Heritage.
I actually concentrate on the church because that's as badly haunted as the Rectory was.
Again, fascinating case, the story of the nun who was supposedly bricked up alive, or, you know, if you want to believe that story, Harry Price, the psychic investigator, found a jawbone.
Again, I know Harry Price was accused.
He was a bit of a showman.
Perhaps he exaggerated some of it.
But that haunting occurred long before you went there and it's still going on.
I've spoken to people who've seen a figure in the churchyard, which they describe as a nun.
Clearly, that place is haunted, but it's almost like she's flitted across to the church.
Now the rectory is gone because I've spoken to people who've heard someone walking up the path to the church, try the door, don't come in.
They go out.
There's no one there.
People have heard footsteps in the church.
People have seen figures in the church.
An old girlfriend of mine was sitting in there taking in the atmosphere and she heard someone walk into the porch and try the door.
They didn't come in.
So she got up to let them in.
There was no one there.
She went into the churchyard, not a sign.
So yeah, fascinating case.
Definitely haunted.
Like I said, the stories about the numb being murdered and bricked up alive.
You know, I don't know whether that was just invented to account for it.
But the problem is if you go to Borley now, the locals don't really like it.
They say it's not haunted.
Go away, please.
We're fed up with you ghost hunters.
And so I don't blame them.
I mean, you get people turning up on Halloween and going into people's gardens, doing Ouija boards, using Ouija boards to try to contact people.
So I don't blame them for being a bit myth.
But I believe Borley is haunted, but the ghosts seem to be in the church now.
I suppose we have to say that, you know, if you've got to investigate ghost cases, try to do it sensibly and responsibly because that's what you would expect if it was your home that was the scene of one of those things.
And that's yeah, I wouldn't be very happy myself if someone sort of walked into my garden and started to do a wishboard session on Halloween and said, oh, I'm just trying to contact the ghosts.
So, but yeah, they actually have a sign there where they did have a sign.
The only ghost here is the Holy Ghost.
Please go away.
Which I thought was quite funny, actually.
Definite sense of humor there.
John, listen, thank you very much indeed for doing this.
We have to say that the next time we talk, your broadband connection will be better because you will have a proper broadband connection at that point.
And we've been doing this on a mobile connection.
I think it's been absolutely fine.
Just so that my listener, who I'm sure will be interested, this is a very good book.
What's the title of the book and how'd you get it?
It's called Britain's Haunted Land and it's available from the publisher JMD Media or available from Amazon, the usual website.
And it came out on Halloween.
So it couldn't have been a spookier time.
Appropriately enough, I would say.
Are you working on anything else at the moment?
Yes, I've got a fourth ghost book called Haunting Towers, which I hope to bring out next year.
I should say the cover was designed by my good friend Jason Figgis, the film director, and he did the intro and also the last chapter on a castle in Cornwall, I think it is.
So yes, we often work together.
Apart from the books, I'm carrying on writing with Psychic News and I've got some film projects with Jason.
We're doing a documentary on Bram Stoker, which I've written the narration for, and some films and things like that.
And I'm also writing, as we speak, the narration for a documentary on poltergeists.
2024 then, I think, is going to be busy for you.
You've said that you're working on this fourth book, Haunted Tales.
Have you got one to leave us with?
Right, from the new book.
Oh, right.
God, I know you're saying something because I've had to delve into it.
I'll give you one.
I'm going to be writing about Framlingham Castle because I now live in Framlingham.
And there's supposed to be a grey lady, abilitary grey lady, haunts Framlingham Castle and has been seen by people gliding across the courtyard, but floating in the air because apparently where she used to walk was a walkway, which has been demolished.
So that's quite interesting.
Now, Matthew Hopkins, who sadly ducked some people in the moat, is supposed to haunt the castle and has been seen basically sitting by a ghostly fire, warming his hands, and doesn't seem particularly bothered about what he did.
But he was a very nice guy, as you will know.
Played by Vincent Price in that wonderful film in the 1960s.
So Family and the Castle is going to be one of them anyway.
There you go.
And Ed Sheeran did a song about it, didn't he?
Yes, he did.
Oh, boy.
John West, listen, thank you very much indeed.
I think we transcended our communication problems.
Thank you.
And I wish you well with the book.
Thank you.
And the man you've been hearing is John West.
My thanks to him.
And thank you to you for being part of this show.
More great guests in the pipeline here at the home of The Unexplained Online.
So until we meet again here, my name is Howard Hughes.
This has been The Unexplained Online.
Please, whatever you do, stay safe, stay calm, and above all, please stay in touch.
Thank you very much.
Take care.
▲
Export Selection